Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Copernicus, Apollo, and Herakles

  • Chapter
The Uses of Antiquity

Part of the book series: Australasian Studies in History and Philosophy of Science ((AUST,volume 10))

Abstract

Copernicus’ personal seal (Fig. 1) is an image taken from classical antiquity. It depicts a near-naked man standing in a distinctive pose, with something flexible slung over his shoulder, while he holds up, and probably plays, a lyre. In an analysis of this seal, Mossakowski identifies the ‘man’ as Apollo, the principal solar deity of late antiquity, and argues that the image is an emblem of cosmic concord:1 its use by the astronomer expresses his belief that the sun binds the universe together in some sort of harmonious unity. It expresses, in other words, the philosophical values already recognised as generating Copernican dissatisfaction with traditional Ptolemaic astronomy.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 169.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 219.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 219.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

References

  1. Stanislaw Mossakowski. ‘The Symbolic Meaning of Copernicus’ Seal.’ Journal of the History of Ideas, 34: 451–460 (1973).

    Google Scholar 

  2. Stanislaw Mossakowski. ‘The Symbolic Meaning of Copernicus’ Seal.’, Journal of the History of Ideas, 34, 454–7 (1973). There are various spellings of Gaforus’ name and book-title in circulation: I follow the British Library Catalogue. The inscription on the banner comes from Nomina Musarum (line 9) in the appendix to Ausonius, transl. H. White, Loeb series, II, London (1961), pp. 280–1.

    Google Scholar 

  3. The poem was apparently thought to be Virgilian in the Renaissance: Stanislaw Mossakowski. ‘The Symbolic Meaning of Copernicus’ Seal.’ Journal of the History of Ideas, 34: 451–460 (1973). and

    Google Scholar 

  4. Edgar Wind, Pagan mysteries in the Renaissance, rev. edn. New York (1968), pp. 267–8. The next line of Nomina Musarum describes the sun (Apollo-Phoebus) as ‘residing in the middle’ (in medio residens).

    Google Scholar 

  5. For a detailed survey of the myths of the various Herakles, see Robert Graves, The Greek Myths, 2 Vols. Harmondsworth (1966), passim, esp. II, pp. 84–206.

    Google Scholar 

  6. A good seventeenth century examples is provided in the Galerie d’Apollon at the Louvre: one of the main ceiling paintings here depicts Apollo with his lyre, accompanied by his sister Artemis. The immediately neighbouring panel contains a painting of the zodiac, and another depicts Apollo’s victory over Python, while the whole room is full of references to astronomy, music, the Muses, and Apollo. A particular clear (but rather late) example is the ceiling painting (by Lemoine, dated 1733–6) in the Hercules Drawing Room at Versailles. Though the main theme here is the Apotheosis of the hero, the harmony of the universe is overtly referred to by the inclusion of Apollo and the Muses: one of the latter (Euterpe?) plays a lyre, next to another (Urania?) who holds a celestial globe. There are also many references to Herakles in the original seventeenth century portions of the palace. Two good earlier examples of this imagery, neither attached to a strictly royal palace, are provided by the Piazza della Signoria in Florence, and the main entrance stairway to the Doge’s palace in Venice. The latter is flanked by a pair of Herculean statues, one holding the celestial globe, and the other defeating the Lernaean hydra. The Piazza is dominated by numerous statues of heros who represent the myth-complex discussed in the body of the present paper: Herakles (and Cacus), David, Perseus, Judith (and Holofernes), and a celestial Neptune — all paralleling an equestrian Cosimo I de’ Medici — while the whole cycle of Herakles’ labours is represented inside the Palazzo Vecchio. For some further literature see n. 6, on pp. 97–8 of Keith Hutchison, ‘Towards a Political Iconology of the Copernican Revolution’, on pp. 95–141 of Patrick Curry (ed.), Astrology, Science and Society, Woodbridge, Suffolk (1987), and Mario Biagioli, ‘Galileo the Emblem-Maker,’ Isis, 81: 230–58 (1990).

    Google Scholar 

  7. Stanislaw Mossakowski. ‘The Symbolic Meaning of Copernicus’ Seal.’ Journal of the History of Ideas, 34, p. 451 nn. 2–3, citing Adolf Furtwängler, Die Antiken Gemmen: Geschichte der Steinschneidekunst im klassischen Altertum, 3 Vols, Amsterdam (1964–5; 1900), I, pl. XXXIX–4

    Google Scholar 

  8. Adolf Furtwängler, Die Antiken Gemmen: Geschichte der Steinschneidekunst im klassischen Altertum, 3 Vols, Amsterdam (1964, II, p. 186

    Google Scholar 

  9. Adolf Furtwängler, Die Antiken Gemmen: Geschichte der Steinschneidekunst im klassischen Altertum, 3 Vols, Amsterdam (1964, III, p. 348

    Google Scholar 

  10. Adolf Furtwängler, Die Antiken Gemmen: Geschichte der Steinschneidekunst im klassischen Altertum, 3 Vols, Amsterdam (1964–5; 1900), plus I, pl. XLIV–60; Georg Lippold, Gemmen und Kameen des Altertums und der Neuzeit, Stuttgart (n.d.), pl. VIII, pl. IX

    Google Scholar 

  11. Gisela Richter, Engraved Gems of the Greeks Etruscans and Romans, part II: Engraved Gems of the Romans, London (1971), figs 71, 72, 73, 74, 78, 251–3, 678 (perhaps also 727, 727a, 728, 729 which may not however be ancient.)

    Google Scholar 

  12. Adolf Furtwängler, Die Antiken Gemmen: Geschichte der Steinschneidekunst im klassischen Altertum, 3 Vols, Amsterdam (1964–5; 1900),1, pl. XXVII–13

    Google Scholar 

  13. Adolf Furtwängler, Die Antiken Gemmen: Geschichte der Steinschneidekunst im klassischen Altertum, 3 Vols, Amsterdam (1964 14, pl. XXX–25, pl. LVII–10, described II, pp. 134–5, 167, 260; Georg Lippold, Gemmen und Kameen des Altertums und der Neuzeit, Stuttgart (n.d.), pl. XXXIX (identical with Furtwängler pl. LVII –10)

    Google Scholar 

  14. Gisela Richter, Engraved Gems of the Greeks Etruscans and Romans, part II: Engraved Gems of the Romans, London (1971), figs 279, 692 (again identical with Furtwängler pl. LVII–10).

    Google Scholar 

  15. Kathi Meyer-Baer, Music of the spheres and the Dance of Death: Studies in Musical Iconology, Princeton (1970), p. 268 claims that there are ‘several works’ depicting Herakles as a musician, but only gives a precise reference to Furtwängler, pl. LVII–10, and its repetition in Lippold.

    Google Scholar 

  16. For Apollo, Adolf Furtwängler, Die Antiken Gemmen: Geschichte der Steinschneidekunst im klassischen Altertum, 3 Vols, Amsterdam (1964–5; 1900), I, pl. XXXIX–4

    Google Scholar 

  17. Gisela Richter, Engraved Gems of the Greeks Etruscans and Romans, part II: Engraved Gems of the Romans, London (1971), fig. 72; for Herakles, Furtwängler pl. XXXIV–25 and LVII–10. For the coins, see notes 11 and 23, and, for Renaissance familiarity with them, notes 20 and 23.

    Google Scholar 

  18. For the temple in Rome, see: A. Pauly, G. Wissowa and W. Kroll, Real-Encyclopädie der Classischen Altertumswissenschaft, Vols 1+, Stuttgart (1894+), VIII, pp. 574–6

    Google Scholar 

  19. R. Peter in W. H. Röscher, Ausführliches Lexikon der Griechischen und Römischen Mythologie, Vol I, part 2, Leipzig (1886–1890), cols 2970–6

    Google Scholar 

  20. H. A. Grueber, Coins of the Roman Republic in the British Museum, 3 Vols, London (1970; 1910), I, p. 442n. I have not been able to consult the principal literary source for the founding of this temple, Eumenius (the third century rhetorician), Pro Rest. Schol., 7. The works just cited note the important evidence for this temple provided by coins (as in Fig. 4), and Pauly et al., indicate that it is also documented via a fragment of a town-plan. For the passages cited, see: Ovid, Art of Love, III. 165–8, transl, by J. Mozley, Loeb series, II, London (1969), pp. 128–9; Suetonius, Divi Augusti Vita, 29; Macrobius, Saturnalia, I.xii.16, transl. P. Davies, New York (1969), p. 87; Plutarch, Roman Questions, 59 = Moralia, 278D–E, transl. F. Babbitt, Loeb series IV, London (1936), pp. 94–5.

    Google Scholar 

  21. Xenophon, Memorabilia, 2.1.21–34 (= Loeb, pp. 94–103); Dio Chrysostom, First discourse, On Kingship, 58–84 (= Loeb I, pp. 31–47), Eighth Discourse, On Virtue, esp. 27–36 (= Loeb I, pp. 390–99), Thirty-First Discourse, 16 (= Loeb III, pp. 20–1). Cf. G. Karl Galinsky, The Heracles Theme: The Adaptions of the Hero in Literature …, Oxford (1972), passim., but especially pp. 35–6, 39nl7, 101–3, 162, 198ff

    Google Scholar 

  22. R. Hoistad, Cynic Hero and Cynic King, Lund (1948), pp. 150ff

    Google Scholar 

  23. Erwin Panofsky, Hercules am Scheideweg, Leipzig (1930), pp. 43–52

    Google Scholar 

  24. Erwin Panofsky, Hercules am Scheideweg, Leipzig (1930) 150–66.

    Google Scholar 

  25. Plato, Republic VII, 528E–531D (= Loeb II, pp. 178–195); Aristotle, Politics, Vffl.ii.3 (1337b20–35), VIIL.iv.3-vii.ll (1339al0–1342b35) (= Loeb, pp. 638–9, 648 –75); Plutarch, Alcibiades, II.4–6 (= Loeb Lives IV, pp. 6–89); Oxford Classical Dictionary, edited N. Hammond and H. Scullard, 2nd edition, Oxford (1970), p. 705 (‘Music’); The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, ed. S. Sadie, I, London (1980), pp. 699–702 (‘Aulos’); Jamie Kassler, ‘Apollo and Dionysos: Music Theory and the Western Tradition of Epistemology’, Music and Civilization: Essays in Honor of Paul Henry Long, E. Strainchamps and M. Maniates (eds.), London (1985), pp. 457–8

    Google Scholar 

  26. John Hollander, The Untuning of the Sky: Ideas of Music in English Poetry 1500–1700, Princeton (1961), p. 35

    Google Scholar 

  27. W. K. C. Guthrie, The Greeks and their Gods, London (1977), pp. 48

    Google Scholar 

  28. W. K. C. Guthrie, The Greeks and their Gods, London (1977) 148

    Google Scholar 

  29. W. K. C. Guthrie, The Greeks and their Gods, London (1977) 157

    Google Scholar 

  30. W. K. C. Guthrie, The Greeks and their Gods, London (1977) 314–5

    Google Scholar 

  31. Stephen Kolsky, ‘Images of Isabella d’Esté’, Italian Studies, 39, 47–62, p. 53 (1984)

    Google Scholar 

  32. Kathi Meyer-Baer, Music of the spheres and the Dance of Death: Studies in Musical Iconology, Princeton (1970), p. 205.

    Google Scholar 

  33. Pausanius, Description of Greece, IX.29.6–9 (= Loeb IV, pp. 296–99); Diordorus of Sicily, History, III.67.1–3 (= Loeb II, pp. 304–7); Apollodorus, The Library, I.iii.2, II.iv.9, transl. J. G. Frazer, Loeb series, 2 Vols, London (1967–1970), I, pp. 16–17, 174–7; Frazer’s note 5 to Apollodorus, op. cit., Loeb I, p. 16

    Google Scholar 

  34. Joseph Fontenrose, Python: A Study of Delphic Myth and its Origins, Berkeley (1959), pp. 111–2. For examples of the paralleling of the bow (Apollo’s canonical weapon) with the lyre, see: the juxtaposition of the two images of Apollo in Callimachus, Hymn to Apollo, lines 19, 33, 43–4, 90–110 (= Loeb Callimachus and Lycophron and Aratus, pp. 50–3, 56–9), as discussed

    Google Scholar 

  35. Frederick Williams, Callimachus Hymn to Apollo: A Commentary, Oxford (1978), pp. 29–30

    Google Scholar 

  36. Frederick Williams, Callimachus Hymn to Apollo: A Commentary, Oxford (1978) 40; Heraclitus’ illustration of the doctrine of the harmony of opposites via the metaphor of the lute and bow, as quoted Plutarch, Moralia, 36 9B (= Loeb V, pp. 108–9), and as discussed

    Google Scholar 

  37. W. K. C. Guthrie, A History of Greek Philosophy, 5 Vols, Cambridge (1962–78), I, pp. 439–440.

    Google Scholar 

  38. Joseph Fontenrose, Python: A Study of Delphic Myth and its Origins, Berkeley (1959), pp. 339–40

    Google Scholar 

  39. Jocelyn Small, Cacus and Marsyas in Etruscan and Roman Legend, Princeton (1982), passim. but esp. pp. xiv, 4 and Figs 1, 3, 4, 6; Virgil, Aeneid, VIII.305, transl. H. Rushton Fairclough, Loeb series, 2 Vols, London (1967–1969), II, pp. 80–1.

    Google Scholar 

  40. For characteristics of Mercury, Robert Graves, The Greek Myths, 2 Vols. Harmondsworth (1966), passim, esp. I, pp. 63–7; Oxford Classical Dictionary, N. Hammond and H. Scullard, 2nd edition, Oxford (1970), pp. 502–3 (‘Hermes (1)’); Diodorus of Sicily, History, V.75 (= Loeb III, pp. 300–301); Plutarch, Moralia, 352A (= Loeb V, pp. 10–11); Hyginus, Poetica Astronomica, 11.42; Anthony Pomey, The Pantheon, transl. J. A. B., London (1694); reprinted New York (1976); first Latin edn (1653), pp. 60–4

    Google Scholar 

  41. Kathi Meyer-Baer, Music of the spheres and the Dance of Death: Studies in Musical Iconology, Princeton (1970), p. 288.

    Google Scholar 

  42. Lucian, Herakles, as transl. H. W. and F. G. Fowler, The Works of Lucian of Samosata, III, Oxford (1905), pp. 256–9. It should however be noted that Lucian attributes the view of Herakles as eloquent to the Gauls, not to the Greeks and Romans. But compare Plutarch, Moralia, 356A–B (= Loeb V, pp. 34–5) on Dionysos.

    Google Scholar 

  43. Robert Graves, The Greek Myths, 2 Vols. Harmondsworth (1966), passim, esp. II, pp. 92, 93n7, 142–3n3, 212–3.

    Google Scholar 

  44. Lilio Giraldi (1479–1552), De Deis Gentium, Basel (1548); reprinted New York (1976), p. 456. This book was dedicated to a modern Herakles, Ercolo II, the fourth d’Este duke of Giraldi’s home-town Ferrara — where Copernicus himself had lived some 45 years before the appearance of his near-contemporary’s book. It appears though not to be known when Copernicus started using his seal: Stanislaw Mossakowski. ‘The Symbolic Meaning of Copernicus’ Seal.’ Journal of the History of Ideas, 34: 451–460, p. 453.

    Google Scholar 

  45. Gerardus Vossius, De Theologia Gentili, Amsterdam (1641); reprinted in 3 Vols, New York (1976), I, second p. 87

    Google Scholar 

  46. Andrea Alciati [and C. Mignault], Emblemata cum Commentariis, Padua (1621); reprinted New York (1976), pp. 129, 599, 775. The quoted descriptions of these books comes from Stephen Orgel’s introductory notes to the reprints used.

    Google Scholar 

  47. Vicenzo Cartari [and Lorenzo Pignoria, annotator], Imagini delli Dei de gl’Antichi, Venice (1647); reprinted Graz (1963), pp. 180–1, 320–1 (my translation). The first edition of this book came out in 1556, but was unillustrated, and did not have the annotations by Pignoria. The next (?) edition (1571; reprinted New York (1976), dedicated like Lilio Giraldi (1479–1552), De Deis Gentium, Basel (1548); reprinted New York (1976) to the d’Este family of Ferrara) had engravings by Bolognino Zaltieri, and included the Lucian image on pp. 340–1. It is not in the unillustrated 1599 English truncated translation by Richard Lynche, The Fountaine of Ancient Fiction, (reprinted New York, 1976), but the eloquence of Herakles is mentioned (again within the discussion of Mercury, at Si, unpaginated). The Pignoria notes were first (?) attached to the Padua, 1615 edition, Le Vere e Nove Imagini de gli Dei delli Antichi, where the ‘Copernican’ image is included on pp. 545–6. The quoted description of Cartari’s book comes from Stephen Orgel’s introductory note to the New York (1976) reprint of the 1571 edition. For the Renaissance’s especial recognition of Herakles’ eloquence

    Google Scholar 

  48. G. Karl Galinsky, The Heracles Theme: The Adaptions of the Hero in Literature …, Oxford (1972), passim., but especially, pp. 222–4

    Google Scholar 

  49. Lilio Giraldi (1479–1552), De Deis Gentium, Basel (1548); reprinted New York (1976), p. 455

    Google Scholar 

  50. Bocchi, Symbolicarum Quaestionum, Bologna (1574); reprinted New York (1979), pp. 92–3

    Google Scholar 

  51. Abraham Fraunce, The Third Part of… Yuychurch, London (1599); reprinted New York (1976), p. 49

    Google Scholar 

  52. Andrea Alciati [and C. Mignault], Emblemata cum Commentariis, Padua (1621); reprinted New York (1976), pp. 599, 753

    Google Scholar 

  53. Alexander Ross, Mystagogus Poeticus, or The Muses Interpreter, 2nd edn, London (1648); reprinted New York (1976), pp. 170, 187

    Google Scholar 

  54. Gerardus Vossius, De Theologia Gentili, Amsterdam (1641); reprinted in 3 Vols, New York (1976), 1, pp. 266, 382.

    Google Scholar 

  55. Vicenzo Cartari [and Lorenzo Pignoria, annotator], Imagini delli Dei de gl’Antichi, Venice (1647); reprinted Graz (1963), 1647 edn, p. 320–1.

    Google Scholar 

  56. John Hollander, The Untuning of the Sky: Ideas of Music in English Poetry 1500–1700, Princeton (1961), pp. 194–206, and illustrations (unnumbered) following p. 242.

    Google Scholar 

  57. Albrecht Altdorfer (1480–1531), ‘Hercules and a Muse’ (B28 = Bartsch VIII, p. 51), reproduced in my Fig. 6 from Adam von Bartsch, The Illustrated Bartsch, Vols 1+, New York (1978+), XIV, p. 36. Master of the Die (= Le Maître au dé), ‘Envy Driven from the Temple of the Muses’ (B17 = Bartsch XV, p. 195), reproduced in Illustrated Bartsch, XXIX, p. 174. Enea Vico, (1523–1567), engraving ‘Man Playing a Lyre’, (B121 = Bartsch XV, p. 322), reproduced in my Fig. 7, from Illustrated Bartsch, XXX, p. 95: this is easily recognized as Herakles because of the lion skin over the shoulder.

    Google Scholar 

  58. Laurentius Beger, Hercules Ethnicorum, Berlin (1705), pp. 31–2: note that one of Beger’s figures is labelled with the Apolline epithet ‘Herculi Musarum Pythus’ (my emphasis). For a near-contemporary (1694) application of the epithet ‘Pythius’ to Apollo, Anthony Pomey, The Pantheon, transl. J. A. B., London (1694); reprinted New York (1976); first Latin edn (1653), p. 45.

    Google Scholar 

  59. For the Roman coins, A. Pauly, G. Wissowa and W. Kroll, Real-Encyclopädie der Classischen Altertumswissenschaft, Vols 1+, Stuttgart (1894+), VIII, p. 576; R. Peter in W. H. Röscher, Ausführliches Lexikon der Griechischen und Römischen Mythologie, Vol. I, col. 2972

    Google Scholar 

  60. H. A. Grueber, Coins of the Roman Republic in the British Museum, 3 Vols, London (1970; 1910), Vol. I, pp. 251 (n. 2), 441–2 (nn. 1, 2), 441 –6 (coins 3602–3632, esp. 3602–5), 450–1 (n. 2), Vol. Ill, pl. xlv–13. For the Greek medal

    Google Scholar 

  61. see Guillaume du Choul, Discours de la Religion des Anciens Romains …. Illustré, Lyon (1556); reprinted New York (1976), p. 180. The quoted description of this book comes from S. Orgel’s introductory note to the reprint.

    Google Scholar 

  62. Robert Graves, The Greek Myths, 2 Vols. Harmondsworth (1966), passim, esp. II, pp. 84–206

    Google Scholar 

  63. Jonathan Brown and J. Elliot, A Palace for a King: The Buen Retiro and the Court of Philip IV, New Haven (1980), pp. 156–161

    Google Scholar 

  64. Jonathan Brown and J. Elliot, A Palace for a King: The Buen Retiro and the Court of Philip IV, New Haven (1980) 212–3

    Google Scholar 

  65. Hildegard Utz, ‘The Labors of Hercules and Other Works by Vicenzo de’ Rossi’, Art Bulletin, 53, 344–66, esp. 356–60 (1971).

    Google Scholar 

  66. Graves cites no precise passages for this point, and scrutiny of the sources cited by Brown and Utz, shows the former to be completely dependent on the latter, and the latter completely dependent on Vicenzo Cartari [and Lorenzo Pignoria, annotator], Imagini delli Dei de gl’Antichi, Venice (1647); reprinted Graz (1963), pp. 180–1, (locations as cited below, note 36). Cartari’s ancient source is Macrobius, but again no precise passage is cited. When Coluccio Salutati similarly cites Macrobius, in his 1406 De laboribus Hercules, III. 15 (ed. B. L. Ullman, Zurich (1951), p. 168), his modern (and seemingly thorough) editor identifies the passage as that quoted above (p. 10): there is no reference there to the belief that the labours correspond to the signs of the zodiac. This suggest that Macrobius does not in fact discuss the issue. Similarly, when George Sandys discusses the issue in his Ovids Metamorphosis Englished, Mythologized, and Represented in Figures …, Oxford (1632); reprinted New York (1976), p. 325, he cites Macrobius for an identification with sun, but cites (p. 329) Porphry (unspecified location) for the identification with the signs of the zodiac.

    Google Scholar 

  67. Plutarch, Moralia, 367E (= Loeb V, pp. 100–101); The Epic of Gilgamesh, transl. N. K. Sandars, rev. edn, Harmondsworth (1972), pp. 24, 36–7, 61, 71–2, 79, 89–92, 96–99

    Google Scholar 

  68. Joseph Fontenrose, Python: A Study of Delphic Myth and its Origins, Berkeley (1959), pp, 167–75

    Google Scholar 

  69. Robert Graves, The Greek Myths, 2 Vols. Harmondsworth (1966), passim, esp. II. pp. 84–206.

    Google Scholar 

  70. Robert Graves, The Greek Myths, 2 Vols. Harmondsworth (1966), passim, esp. II, pp. 87(§i), 89(n. 2), 103(n. 3), 105(§h), 106–7(nn. 1, 3), 108–9(§g and n. 2), 114(§g), 151(n. 3). The lion, the bull, the scorpion, the water-snake (sic), the crab, and the centaur are the zodiacal constellations which Graves explicitly notes to be connected with Herakles’ labours.

    Google Scholar 

  71. Cf. C. Kerényi, The Heroes of the Greeks, London (1974), pp. 143

    Google Scholar 

  72. C. Kerényi, The Heroes of the Greeks, London (1974) 145

    Google Scholar 

  73. C. Kerényi, The Heroes of the Greeks, London (1974) 198.

    Google Scholar 

  74. The Aeneid of Thomas Phaer and Thomas Twyne: A critical edition…, ed. S. Lally, New York (1987), p. 26: this portion of the translation is dated 1555. For other examples of the zodiacal motion interpretation, see: Servius and Donatus, in Virgil, Opera, (1544), op. cit., note 29, pp. 189–9; Jacobus Pontanus, Symbolarum LibriXVII Virgilii, 3 Vols, Augsburg (1599); reprinted New York (1976), I. cols 424–5 (on Georgics, II. 478), II, cols 813–4 (on Aeneid, I. 742) (who interprets the word as either the motion of the sun, or its eclipse); comparison between descriptions of motions of moon (p. 42b) and sun (p. 33b)

    Google Scholar 

  75. Abraham Fraunce, The Third Part of… Yuychurch, London (1599); James Henry’s commentary on the line of Virgil just cited, in his Aeneidea, or Critical, Exegetical and Aesthetical Remarks on the Aeneis, Vol. I, London (1873), p. 852.

    Google Scholar 

  76. Livy, I.i.1–I.ii.6 (= Loeb I, pp. 8–13); Horace, Odes, III.iii.9, (= Loeb, pp. 178–9); Dio Chrysostom, Eighth Discourse, On Virtue, 27–9 (= Loeb I, pp. 390–3); The Epic of Gilgamesh, transl. N. K. Sandars, rev. edn, Harmondsworth (1972), pp. 61, 91, 97, 101–6, 117; Plutarch, Moralia, 341F–342A, 361D (= Loeb IV, pp. 468–9, V, pp. 66–7), Alexander, XLI.l (= Loeb Lives VII, pp. 344–5); Arrian, Anabasis, V.4, V.26, 29, VII.l, VII.9–10 (= Loeb II, pp. 10–11, 84–91, 96–97, 206–7, 232–3); Quintus Curtius Rufus, IX.ii.29, IX.iii.14 (= Loeb II, pp. 384–5, 390–1, where Pater Liber is Dionysos); Homer, Odyssey, (e.g., I.2, = Loeb pp. 2–3); Apollodorus, Epitome, VI.29–VII.l (= Loeb II, pp. 278–9); Nonnos, Dionysiaca, IV.270, 287, 293 (= Loeb I, pp. 152–5); Richard Lynche, The Fountaine of Ancient Fiction, (reprinted New York, 1976), pp. Tb–Tijb.

    Google Scholar 

  77. Diodorus of Sicily, History, I.13–20, III.64, 72–4, V.76 (= Loeb I, pp. 44–65, II, pp. 296–7, 322–333, III, pp. 302–3); Plutarch, Theseus, VI, XXIV–XXV (= Loeb Lives I, pp. 12–17, 50–57). Cf. Plutarch, Moralia, 332A–B, 356A–B (= Loeb IV, pp. 412–3, V, pp. 34–5); Guillaume du Choul, Discours de la Religion des Anciens Romains …. Illustré, Lyon (1556); reprinted New York (1976), pp. 182–4

    Google Scholar 

  78. G. Karl Galinsky, The Heracles Theme: The Adaptions of the Hero in Literature …, Oxford (1972), passim., p. 132 (and p. 12, from which the quoted description of Herakles is taken.)

    Google Scholar 

  79. Diodorus of Sicily, History, III.60, IV.27, transl. H. C. Oldfather, Loeb series, vol.II, London (1961), pp. 278–9, 430–1; Servius, Virgil [and collected commentators], Opera, Venice (1544); reprinted New York (1976), I, p. 99; Augustine, City of God, XVIII.8, (= Loeb V, pp. 386–9).

    Google Scholar 

  80. Compare: Robert Graves, The Greek Myths, 2 Vols. Harmondsworth (1966), passim, esp. II, 150–1n1. For Renaissance examples, see below note 37.

    Google Scholar 

  81. Alexander Ross, Mystagogus Poeticus, or The Muses Interpreter, 2nd edn, London (1648); reprinted New York (1976), p. 168. Cf. Coluccio Salutati similarly cites Macrobius, in his 1406 De laboribus Hercules, III. 15 (ed. B. L. Ullman, Zurich (1951), p. 168; Natalis Comes, Mythologie, transl. J. Baudouin, Paris (1627); reprinted in 2 Vols, New York (1976), (II), pp. 708–9; George Sandys discusses the issue in his Ovids Metamorphosis Englished, Mythologized, and Represented in Figures …, Oxford (1632); reprinted New York (1976), pp. 322, 325 (misnumbered as 335)–7, 329

    Google Scholar 

  82. Andrea Alciati [and C. Mignault], Emblemata cum Commentariis, Padua (1621); reprinted New York (1976), p. 599

    Google Scholar 

  83. Gerardus Vossius, De Theologia Gentili, Amsterdam (1641); reprinted in 3 Vols, New York (1976), I, second, pp. 382–5

    Google Scholar 

  84. Vicenzo Cartari [and Lorenzo Pignoria, annotator], Imagini delli Dei de gl’Antichi, Venice (1647), 1571 edn, p. 450, 1647 edn, p. 184. Philostratus, Les Images, transl. B. de Vigenère, Paris (1614); reprinted New York (1976), p. 464.

    Google Scholar 

  85. Servius, Virgil [and collected commentators], Opera, Venice (1544); reprinted New York (1976), I, p. 199 (Servius and Ascensius); Abraham Fraunce, The Third Part of… Yuychurch, London (1599); reprinted New York (1976), p. 46b–47a (misnumbered as 49). The quoted description of Fraunce’s book comes from S. Orgel’s introduction to the reprint edition. Cf.: de Vigenère, in Philostratus, Les Images, transl. B. de Vigenère, Paris (1614); reprinted New York (1976), p. 466

    Google Scholar 

  86. Gerardus Vossius, De Theologia Gentili, Amsterdam (1641); reprinted in 3 Vols, New York (1976), frontispiece, and I, p. 384; Lilio Giraldi (1479–1552), De Deis Gentium, Basel (1548); reprinted New York (1976), p. 457; Giovanni Boccaccio, Genealogiae, Venice (1494); reprinted New York (1976), p. 97; Bocchi, Symbolicarum Quaestionum, Bologna (1574); reprinted New York (1979), pp. 236–7; Natalis Comes, Mythologiae, Venice (1567); reprinted New York (1976), p. 105, Natalis Comes, Mythologie, transl. J. Baudouin, Paris (1627); reprinted in 2 Vols, New York (1976), (II), pp. 312–3 (a passage which cites the Aeneid line I.742 discussed above); George Sandys discusses the issue in his Ovids Metamorphosis Englished, Mythologized, and Represented in Figures …, Oxford (1632); reprinted New York (1976), pp. 167, 327; Coluccio Salutati similarly cites Macrobius, in his 1406 De laboribus Hercules, III. 15 (ed. B. L. Ullman, Zurich (1951), p. 309

    Google Scholar 

  87. Alexander Ross, Mystagogus Poeticus, or The Muses Interpreter, 2nd edn, London (1648); reprinted New York (1976), pp. 37,169,175.

    Google Scholar 

  88. Stanislaw Mossakowski. ‘The Symbolic Meaning of Copernicus’ Seal.’ Journal of the History of Ideas, 34: (1973), p. 453. Mossakowski here says (n. 8) that the Mercury image was to have been published in vol. III of the Copernicus Opera Omnia. This presumably refers to Nicholas Copernicus, Minor Works, ed. P. Czartoryski, transl. E. Rosen and E. Hilfstein, London (1985), pp. 29, 51 (first note 6), but I have not been able to find it there.

    Google Scholar 

  89. Joseph Fontenrose, Python: A Study of Delphic Myth and its Origins, Berkeley (1959), pp. 111–2, is a sustained argument for the unity of the myth-variants in question, with particular emphasis on the relationship between Apollo and Herakles, and I rely greatly on his account here. Compare the similar arguments and presumptions in

    Google Scholar 

  90. Mircea Eliade, Cosmos and History: The Myth of the Eternal Return, transl. W. Trask, New York (1985), pp. 37–9

    Google Scholar 

  91. Francis Cornford, Principium Sapientiae: The Origins of Greek Philosophical Thought, Cambridge (1952), pp. 226–56.

    Google Scholar 

  92. Note that even the dissident view of J. G. Griffiths, The Conflict of Horus and Seth: From Egyptian and Classical Sources, Liverpool (1960), pp. 128–30 accepts much of what the proponents of unity claim.

    Google Scholar 

  93. Joseph Fontenrose, Python: A Study of Delphic Myth and its Origins, Berkeley (1959), pp. 111–2, has a whole chapter on this theme (pp. 217–73) but he tends to take the issues which concern us here for granted, and I plan to prepare a further study of this issue as a sequel to the present paper. For Fontenrose does not provide systematic evidence for the links between combat and cosmic harmony, beyond those implied in the occurrence of monster-combat in creation myths, where the harmony of the universe is established. The sort of primary evidence used to establish my more general interpretation is that provided in Plutarch’s discussion of the myth of Isis and Osiris, Moralia, 351C–384C (= Loeb V, pp. 6 –191), and books I and II of Nonnos, Dionysiaca, (= Loeb I, pp. 2–97), the most important cosmic passages being I.163–258, II.163–435, 565–619, 650–678.

    Google Scholar 

  94. Cf. Jean-Pierre Vevnant, The Origins of Greek Thought, Ithaca, N.Y. (1982), pp. 108–118.

    Google Scholar 

  95. Nicolas Copernicus, Letter to the Pope, in De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium, Nuremberg (1543), transl. by A. M. Duncan as On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres, New York (1976), p. 25.

    Google Scholar 

  96. Compare, Bocchi, Symbolicarum Quaestionum, Bologna (1574); reprinted New York (1979), pp. 236–7

    Google Scholar 

  97. extract from the preface to Thomas Digges, Alae sue scalae mathematicae, London (1573)

    Google Scholar 

  98. as transl. on p. 347 of J. Dreyer, A History of Astronomy from Thales to Kepler, 2nd edition, revised W. H. Stahl, New York (1953)

    Google Scholar 

  99. Galileo Galilei, Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems — Ptolemaic and Copernican, transl. S. Drake, Berkeley (1962), pp. 341

    Google Scholar 

  100. Galileo Galilei, Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems — Ptolemaic and Copernican, transl. S. Drake, Berkeley (1962) 366. Copernicus’ immediate source appears to be the opening lines of Horace’s, Art of Poetry, (= Loeb, pp. 450–1): see Nicholas Copernicus On the Revolutions, ed. J. Dobrzycki, transl. with commentary by E. Rosen, London (1978), pp. 338 (note to 3:37), 341 (note to 4:25).

    Google Scholar 

  101. But the image was a common one in ancient literature: Joseph Fontenrose, Python: A Study of Delphic Myth and its Origins, Berkeley (1959), pp. 152

    Google Scholar 

  102. Galileo Galilei, Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems — Ptolemaic and Copernican, transl. S. Drake, Berkeley (1962) 207

    Google Scholar 

  103. Galileo Galilei, Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems — Ptolemaic and Copernican, transl. S. Drake, Berkeley (1962) 243

    Google Scholar 

  104. Galileo Galilei, Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems — Ptolemaic and Copernican, transl. S. Drake, Berkeley (1962) 308, and Apollonius of Rhodes, Argonautica, IV.673–681 (= Loeb, pp. 338–41).

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Authors
  1. Keith Hutchison
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Traditional and Modern Philosophy, University of Sydney, Australia

    Stephen Gaukroger

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 1991 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Hutchison, K. (1991). Copernicus, Apollo, and Herakles. In: Gaukroger, S. (eds) The Uses of Antiquity. Australasian Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, vol 10. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-3412-5_1

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-3412-5_1

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht

  • Print ISBN: 978-94-010-5510-9

  • Online ISBN: 978-94-011-3412-5

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation